


These Are My Friends

by LemonCakeDesign



Series: Almost (Sweet Music) [13]
Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Gift Giving, Symbolism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-29
Updated: 2020-05-29
Packaged: 2021-03-03 02:42:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24437635
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LemonCakeDesign/pseuds/LemonCakeDesign
Summary: And they don't care who you areThey don't care what you do, noThese are my friends, these are my friendsI love them, I love themBond Bracelets — Considered to be an archaic practice by many Miqo'te today, these pieces of jewelry were once given to friends, family, and lovers. Traditionally made with leather cord and clay beads, though those of a more modern mindset will also incorporate glass or metal. It is said that there are over a thousand meanings based on placement and color of beads, as well as knot shape.
Relationships: (mentioned) - Relationship, Scions of the Seventh Dawn & Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Warrior of Light/Thancred Waters
Series: Almost (Sweet Music) [13]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1535039
Comments: 2
Kudos: 24





	These Are My Friends

Valliant is the first to get her bracelet.

Pike starts making hers shortly after he makes the one for Haurchefant. It’s easy to find the knots and beads for her. Silver, blue, and white. Evenly placed among the stack of alternating half-knots, until it's wide enough to rest on her wrist comfortably.

“Silver, for strength,” Pike tells her, when he gives it to her in Ishgard. “The color of our weapons, of course. Blue is for protection, like the sky . And white is for love. Placing them evenly means you’re a grounding presence in my life, and having them spread across the whole bracelet means that I want you in my life, forever. We call this the cobra knot, and kids usually use it for making bracelets for their parents, because it's easy to learn.”

He doesn’t say it, out loud, the meaning he ascribes to that. But judging by the slightly wet sheen in her eyes and the crushing hug she pulls him into, she gets it.

Pike doesn’t see the bracelet often. He knows Valliant wears it, under the gauntlets and heavy plate that lets her take the heavy hits, but it’s hard to see it there.

Instead, it’s reserved for the tender moments, when they’re relaxed and she’s shed some of the hard shell. Days at cafes, sipping tea and laughing over sandwiches. Nights, when they sit by a fire and read. 

And when Valliant lies prone in the infirmary bed, gone to the same strange place as the rest of the Scions.

She goes the same time as Alisiae, which feels right to Pike. Like some sense told her she needed to protect the twins. He hopes they’re all together, wherever they are. Because if they’re just as lonely and afraid as he is…

Well. He doesn’t think he could bear it.

Maybe it’s selfish, but Pike misses Valliant the most. They’re hardly ever separated, since Doma, and he keeps turning, expecting to see her at his back, taking the blow that’s aimed at it.

He gets hurt a lot before he stops expecting her.

* * *

Alphinaud is next.

Pike puzzles over it for a while, trying to quantify who Alphinaud is to him. He’s sort of in the same position in his heart as Elphina was, but more equal. A little more brother-in-arms than just little brother.

He goes for something similar to Valliant, when he realizes it. The crown knot, he decides. He gets white, of course, along with black, and purple.

Pike finishes it before they depart for Azys Lla, and doesn’t that just feel appropriate. He pulls him aside on the airship soon after they’ve departed.

“You know white, already, do you remember?” Pike says, when he hands over the bracelet. Alphinaud nods in response, too stunned for words. “Black is for knowledge, the color of ink, and it makes me think of your carbuncle. And the purple is for honor. Purple dye is hard to come by, so it’s traditionally used for leaders. They’re grouped into twos, which is a promise to stay by your side. It’s for—” He falters. “Huh, the Echo can’t translate that one for me. It’s sort of like...a friend you hunt with? But also a promise to watch each other’s backs.”

Alphinaud is a bit misty when he answers. “Thank you, Pike.” He doesn’t initiate the hug, but hugs back just as hard as Pike.

The beads catch the light when they rip Nidhogg’s eyes from Estinien’s body, and it bolsters Pike. And they come alight in the fading Yanxian sunset when Alphinaud declares that he’ll go to Garlemald to try his hand at diplomacy.

And it dangles on his wrist when Gaius Baelsar carries him across the border and places him in Pike’s arms.

Valliant punches Gaius and Pike feels like he should, too, only he’s too busy staring at Alphinaud in horror. There’s just white noise in his ears. He doesn’t even notice he’s crying until the tears start to fall on Alphinaud’s face. 

Alisiae is just as distraught, and when they’ve placed Alphinaud in the infirmary, Pike holds her close, hoping she won’t go anywhere.

* * *

Pike starts Alisiae’s bracelet after the battle with the Warriors of Darkness.

Alisiae is straightforward, and Pike abandons the complicated knots each time he starts them. They feel antithetical to him. Instead, he sticks to a simple braid, knotting the red, white, yellow, and orange beads in each bump. In the end, it mimics Alisiae’s own braid.

By this point, Alisiae’s already interrogated Alphinaud about his bracelet, and Pike’s caught her giving him sad, puppy eye glances. He carefully keeps his work from her, because the smile that blossoms when he presents it to her is beautiful.

“Red for passion, orange for warmth, yellow for camaraderie,” Pike says. “The colors of fire grouped together also means coming home, and the braid is non-traditional, but I thought it fit for you. If I had to ascribe a meaning…” he tilts his head. “Paths weaving together on a journey. A promise that if ever we were to part, we would meet again.”

Alisiae hugs him fiercely. “I’m not leaving anytime soon, but I appreciate it.”

She fiddles with the bracelet a lot, Pike notices. Alisiae is never still, always filled with a determined energy, and the bracelet becomes an outlet for it. He’s glad for it, that it helps her. 

Her unnatural stillness in the infirmary is more unsettling than any of the others. It’s hard for him to even look at her, though he fights through it. He promised, after all, not to leave her alone.

* * *

Making the bracelet for Y’shtola is hard.

Y’shtola is an enigma. Silver, he’ll think one day, but the brute strength of a weapon ill-fits her. So, too, does the elegant strength of pink. He goes through the whole rainbow and can’t decide on any of them.

It’s not until she asks him to read a paper for her that he gets the idea.

Y’shtola is still in sickbed when he gives it to her. “What is this?” She asks.

“Bond bracelet,” he answers, and she understands. 

“Archaic,” she says with a grin. “For my tribe, at least. What colors for me, then?”

Pike settles the bracelet in her outstretched hand. “Feel the beads for me.”

She tilts her head questioningly, but acquiesces. “They’re...textured? These are...Sharlayan runes.”

“I couldn’t decide on a color for you, and I realized that you wouldn’t be able to see them, anyway. I wanted something you could feel,” Pike says. “Urianger helped me with the runes, but the meanings are all my own. One for strength, one for knowledge, one for...Urianger called it magic, but more? It’s hard to tell what he means, but he said it was similar to ‘strength through magical prowess,’ which is what I wanted. And then one of them is the Archon symbol, it seemed appropriate. Oh, the knots are a simple knot pattern, because I didn’t know what they would mean with the runes, and I didn’t want to accidentally curse you. And they’re all white.”

“This is…” Y’shtola breathes out gently. “You put such great thought into these, don’t you?”   


“Bond bracelets are very serious,” Pike says. “And they’re...it’s the last reminder I have of my parents, you know? Sharing that part of myself needs to be something serious, I think.”

She smiles. “I agree.”

Y’shtola wears it with a beaming (for her) pride. It glints in the sun of the Azim Steppe as she calls Magnai “little sun” and destroys his life, and Pike swears the runes glow when she removes the aether blockage. And when she sips her tea with that look that says “you are all so foolish, and I am too old for this,” it clinks against the porcelain.

There’s a dullness to the runes, as she and Urianger fall in front of them. And when he sets her in the infirmary next to Thancred, he feels a little more of the hope drain out of him.

* * *

Pike is sure Urianger is on to him when he asks for help with the runes.

It would be logical to assume that Pike is also making him a bond bracelet. And yet, when Pike hands over a complicated lattice work of black, purple, and gold beads, capped on each end by white beads, Urianger looks completely stunned.

“Of course I made you one, Urianger,” Pike says, shaking his head. “I know we don’t spend much time together, but you are a dear friend to me.” He grins, then launches into describing the bracelet.

Gold is for magic. “I’m not sure the history of that one, actually,” Pike says. “I think there’s a story about spinning wheat into gold? I don’t remember the stories that weren’t songs, sorry.”

“‘Tis alright,” Urianger says. “Thank you, Pike. I had not thought to be so blessed by thee.”

Pike gets a bit red at that. “It’s just a bracelet,” he says, rubbing the back of his hand, then he snaps as he thinks. “Oh, the tying! I nearly forgot. It’s supposed to evoke crochet. The beads are in the center of each ring. Usually we use it to represent mentors, someone who helps you to craft something beautiful. Because crafts are passed down from master to apprentice, and you’ve taught me a lot, even if I miss a lot of it.”

“I see,” Urianger says.

Pike doesn’t often see Urianger out of his thick robe and cowl, so it’s hard for him to tell if he’s wearing the bracelet. He thinks so, though, judging by the way he seemed so surprised and pleased to receive it.

His suspicion is confirmed when Urianger gets called. The knowledge is bittersweet.

* * *

Pike never gives Thancred a bracelet.

At first, he just doesn’t have the time. He knows Thancred well enough, knows exactly what beads and knots he would include in it. But Thancred comes back in the midst of a lot, and Pike doesn’t start on it.

And then they start sleeping together, and Pike starts to realize Thancred’s feelings, and suppress his own. And the idea of giving him something so intimate, so  _ committed _ , scares Pike from even thinking about it.

Thancred never brings it up, even when the rest of them have bracelets. Valliant does, though.

“Last time I gave one of those to someone I was sleeping with, I married him,” is all Pike says. 

And later, when he knows he loves Thancred, it doesn’t even bear thinking about it. Even if Thancred didn’t take it as a sign of commitment, of  _ love _ , Pike would.

Then Thancred gets called, and a lot gets put in perspective for him.

Pike finishes the bracelet just before he leaves for the battlefield. He doesn’t know, when he ties the white and blue beads together, when he adds the light green of rebirth and the bronze of security, that he will fall. He knots the white and black leather together with a figure eight, a white bead in the center of it. Two who are separated coming together as one in love.

Pike reaches for Thancred’s wrist, then stops. “I’ll give this to you, when you come back,” he says, then stands.

All the Scions lie there. All his friends. 

“You will all come back.” 

Then Pike departs, headed to face Elidibus/Zenos in battle. When he leaves the room, he realizes he has never felt lonelier in his life.

* * *

It’s a rare day that all the Scions are together. 

They’re all busier than anything, these days, because capturing Ala Mhigo was of course only the beginning, and Garlemald will hardly let them rest.

So when Pike returns to the Rising Stones, weary from battle, and all the Scions are there, he feels suspicion rise.

They’re all collapsed in various chairs, chatting lowly. It’s just the core group, all the nearest and dearest to Pike’s heart. “Are you all having a party without me?” he asks, taking a seat besides Thancred. 

“We were waiting for you, actually,” Alphinaud says.

“Me?” Pike feels his heart rate raise. Part of him wonders if they’re about to kick him out. “Why?”

“Calm, darling,” Thancred says. “I can hear your heart from here. It’s nothing bad.”

“We just wanted to give you something,” Alisiae explains.

Valliant hands him a cloth bag, and Pike peers curiously at it. There’s a round shape inside, and the faint scent of leather. He opens it and tips the contents into his hand.

There’s a bracelet there, tied with a variety of knots, somehow mixed into a coherent and beautiful piece. Various colors of beads dot it, and Pike suddenly realizes what it means.

“Oh,” he says softly. “A bond bracelet.”

“I confess that I did not recall the colors and their meanings as well as you do,” Y’shtola says. “Until this one, I had never made one myself. But we all did our best.”

Pike runs a finger over the bracelet. “One from all of you?”   


“Well, there is six of us,” Alphinaud says. “We thought that may be too many for you to wear at once, and you would never choose.”

“You’re right,” Pike says with a laugh, tinged with just a bit of the beginning of tears.

“Each of us hath chosen a bead, to represent our own singular bond with thee,” Urianger says. “Mine own is the gold. Thou hast brought such magic to our lives, Pike.”

“I chose orange,” Alisiae says. “Warmth, right?”

“Black,” Alphinaud says. “I have been gifted much knowledge, of myself and the world, through knowing you, Pike.”

“I chose blue.” Valliant points to her bead. “Seemed right. We protect each other, right?”   


Y’shtola pats Pike on the shoulder gently. “Pink, from me. I thought the elegance represented our tea time chats quite well.”

“And…” Thancred turns the bracelet over. “Silver from me. Because your strength is what has carried me forward. And white, of course, from all of us.”

Pike can’t even speak for a moment, shocked into silence. He opens his mouth several times, starting several sentences, but he can’t find the words. “Thank you,” he finally manages to choke out, and tears are falling. “You don’t know how much this means. Thank you.”

They take advantage of having everyone in the same room, for once, and have a proper party. It’s full of laughter and cheer and maybe just a bit too much alcohol, but it warms the very depths of Pike’s soul. He tightens the bracelet around his wrist with a smile, and it doesn’t leave him for the whole day afterwards.

When Pike wakes from dreaming of this moment in Ishgard, he aches. Not just from the wound on his body, but the deep hole in his soul, where his friends should be. He looks down at the bracelet, alone in the room after Aymeric leaves, and he can’t even cry, feeling too empty.

And he remembers the words from the hooded figure, who had called all his friends. Quiet resolve fills him.

“I  _ will _ see you home again.”

**Author's Note:**

> Bond bracelets (though not by name) are first mentioned in [chapter 4 of Little Words](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20446760/chapters/48737843). I love making up little world building things like that, and playing with color theory is a fun way to explore Pike's relationships with each of the Scions.
> 
> Also, I doubt I'll ever mention it, but Tataru, Lyse, and Krile also each get a bracelet. Tataru would probably get pink, Lyse would get red or silver (maybe both), and Krile would get yellow. I just wanted to focus on those who were isekai'd to the First in this fic, because those are who Pike is closest with. I'll probably draw and/or make all of these (with yarn and plastic beads, lol) one day, because as it turns out, describing knots in writing is hard AF. Almost as hard as Urianger's accent, which I _definitely_ got wrong. Oops.
> 
> This is the last of my pre-Shadowbringers works! I want to start writing stuff in Shadowbringers soonish, though I won't go ham on it until after 5.3 so I can hit the story beats properly. I do need a break for a few days (probably closer to a week or two OTL) because I've developed hand cramps something fierce. All of that long winded nonsense to say don't expect anything soon. 
> 
> Hope you're all staying safe and doing well. Tell those you love you love them for me.


End file.
